racism in America
Retail giant Walmart removed a T-shirt and a hooded sweatshirt that depicted a Nazi salute emblazoned on the front, after a multitude of complaints on social media. The T-shirt and hoodie carried the phrase “Paper Beats Rock,” and it showed one hand raised with a flat hand in the upper right corner towering over a raised clenched fist in the lower left corner, holding a rock. The symbolism suggested that fascism would beat Black activism, which prominently uses the raised fist in its protest movements.
The T-shirt and hoodie were made by multiple third-party groups, who listed them for sale on Walmart. One of them, “The Basic Shop,” was identified by online watchdog group LeftCoastRightWatch. There were also reports that the offensive items were available on Amazon. In response, social media users began to work to get the shirts removed, with a Reddit forum dedicated to combating far-right ideologies providing a contact phone number and an online form. According to Snopes, the items were removed from Walmart’s site on Nov. 10.
“We have zero tolerance for any prohibited or offensive products appearing on our marketplace,” a statement from Walmart said. “The items in question were listed by a third-party seller and have been removed from our site for violating our prohibited products policy. When issues like this are identified, we act immediately to remove them and strengthen our systems to prevent a recurrence. The trust of our customers and the integrity of our platform remain paramount.”
It isn’t the first time that Walmart has been called out for having offensive items like this for sale on its website. According to Rolling Stone, the superstore was in hot water last September when a third-party retailer posted two T-shirts promoting the infamous white-power group Skrewdriver on their website.
In an email to LeftCoastRightWatch, Walmart’s Director of Global Communications for the U.S. Marketplace, Blair Cromwell, said: “We have clear guidelines in place, and when items are identified as not meeting our standards or requirements, they are promptly removed and remain blocked from the site. We take these matters seriously and are committed to maintaining a trusted and respectful experience for our customers and communities.”
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According to reports, a man who was one of the January 6th insurrectionists has been arrested for allegedly making terroristic threats against House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Christopher Moynihan, 34, of Clinton, New York, was arrested by Dutchess County police after they were informed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation Joint Terrorism Task Force (FBI-JTT), making him the first of the pardoned J6ers to be arrested for alleged political violence.
Moynihan reportedly sent messages concerning an upcoming appearance that Jeffries was set to make in New York City. The recipient was not specified, according to Reuters.
“Hakeem Jeffries makes a speech in a few days in NYC I cannot allow this terrorist to live. … Even if I am hated he must be eliminated. … I will kill him for the future,” the text messages read, according to the complaint, which was dated Saturday (October 18).
Moynihan was one of the first wave of people who stormed the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6th, 2021, after a speech by now-President Donald Trump, which falsely challenged the outcome of the 2020 presidential elections, which put former President Joe Biden in office. He was one of 1,590 people charged for their actions that day and was sentenced to 21 months in prison in February 2023. He, along with nearly all of the other insurrectionists, was pardoned by Trump on his first day in office this year.
“Unfortunately, our brave men and women in law enforcement are being forced to spend their time keeping our communities safe from these violent individuals who should never have been pardoned,” Jeffries said in a statement. Republican House Majority Leader Mike Johnson decried the incident while appearing at the Capitol building. “Anybody who threatens to kill any political official we denounce it absolutely. We ought to have justice fall upon their head,” he said.Moynihan remains in custody at the Dutchess County Justice and Transition Center in lieu of a $10,000 cash bail, $30,000 bond, or $80,000 partially secured bond, in line for a Class D felony. He is expected to appear for a preliminary hearing on Thursday (October 23).
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Khaby Lame, the most-followed personality on the popular TikTok social media platform, was detained by ICE officials at the Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, Nevada, last Friday (June 6). According to ICE, Khaby Lame has since left the United States and has not made any public statements regarding the stop by the agency, and a MAGA influencer is claiming credit.
In a report from the AFP, Khaby Lame, 25, was detained by ICE at the airport, with officials citing immigration violation for the stop.
“US Immigration and Customs Enforcement detained Seringe Khabane Lame, 25, a citizen of Italy, June 6, at the Harry Reid International Airport, Las Vegas, Nevada for immigration violations,” according to a statement that spokespeople for ICE gave to the AFP.
Khaby Lame catapulted to fame on TikTok for his silent videos and trademark palms-up gesture at the camera, garnering Lame 16.2 million followers on the TikTok platform. Lame has also leveraged his TikTok fame to establish brand deals outside the platform.
Bo Loundon, a rising MAGA influencer whose feed is replete with attacks on anyone that he perceives as a threat to President Donald Trump’s vision of America, claimed that he has worked alongside the Department of Homeland Security to have Lame detained.
“BREAKING: Far-left ILLEGAL ALIEN TikToker Khaby Lame was just ARRESTED and is now in ICE custody under President Trump,” Loudon tweeted on Friday. “I discovered he was an illegal who overstayed an invalid VISA, evaded taxes, and I personally took action to have him deported. No one is above the law!”
Loudon also shared an X post sharing a similar statement to the one given to the AFP. However, it does not confirm an arrest, and Lame was granted voluntary departure on June 6. It does appear that Loudon’s claim of an arrest was largely exaggerated. We also searched ICE’s arrest database, and it did not turn up any results on Lame.
On X, the reactions to Khaby Lame’s arrest and Bo Loudon’s alleged involvement, with some users calling Loudon’s claims false, have turned up. We’ve got them listed below.
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Photo: Getty
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President Donald Trump, already deeply aligned with South African native Elon Musk, made a curious move to invite white refugees to the United States. The move by President Donald Trump was criticized on X, with some noting the contradiction of the policy as it relates to other nationalities.
As reported by the BBC, the first of 49 white South Africans was en route to the United States over the weekend, with President Donald Trump addressing the matter on Monday (May 12). These Afrikaners, who are the minority in the African nation, claim that they’re being targeted and harmed by the Black majority and have made appeals to President Trump to obtain refugee status.
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South Africa’s Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola provided a statement to the press on Monday, saying that “there is no persecution of white Afrikaner South Africans” and pointed to police report data to decry the allegations. Further, the African nation was that the allegations of attacks against White South Africans would not meet the requirements under domestic and international refugee law.
During a press conference alongside Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Donald Trump was asked by a reporter why he is allowing the white refugees a clear path but not doing so for other races of people.
“Because they’re being killed. And we don’t want to see people be killed,” Trump answered. “I have South Africa leadership coming to see me, I understand, sometime next week, and I guess we’re supposed to have a G20 meeting.
Trump continued, “I don’t know how we can go unless that situation’s taken care of. It’s a genocide taking place that you people don’t want to write about. Farmers are being killed. They happen to be white.”
The news of white South Africans being invited to the United States to seek refuge has caught fire on X, and we’ve got reactions below.
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Snow White, the new live-action film starring Rachel Zegler and Gal Gadot, is being panned online by those assumed to be in the MAGA nation, accusing the motion picture of “wokeness.” On X, the reactions to Snow White have been passionate, and other film fans are joining the pile-on to blast some of the acting and more.
Snow White was released last Friday (March 21) and is one of the early big-budget films of the spring season. Zegler stars as the title character, while Gadot plays a contrasting role as the Evil Queen. At issue for the MAGA meatheads is Zegler’s role and the fact that the American actress is Polish and Colombian. Some of the more extreme racist trolls have attacked Zegler’s racial identity, and other film fans are critical of Gadot’s acting and her political positions.
Beyond the culture war being waged over the movie, the early reports are leaning towards the fact that Snow White’s box office opening numbers are a bit underwhelming. With a budget reported to be between $240-270 million, the film had a worldwide weekend opening of about $86 million, according to The Numbers website.
Professional critics largely called the film a refreshing update on the classic tale, and it manages to put forth some progressive themes here and there. Also present in the film is the goal of female empowerment and other stylistic and source material changes. It is there where MAGA and online trolls are having the most issues.
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Photo: Getty
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Bloody Sunday, the day when hundreds of people peacefully marched from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, yet were met with violence, occurred 60 years ago (March 7, 1965) today. In the decades since the disturbing events of Bloody Sunday, some strides were made, yet racial tensions remain as strained as ever in parts of the country.
The efforts of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) in the southern states were noteworthy as there existed the tendrils of Jim Crow despite landmark rulings such as the Civil Rights Act being passed in 1964. The SNCC rallied its efforts to bring forth voter equality for the Black electorate and was met with barriers of all sorts.
With the brutal police shooting death of activist and deacon Jimmie Lee Jackson, SNCC and SCLC leaders used the moment as a spark for a peaceful march from Selma to Montgomery. The march was comprised of around 600 people, with Rev. Hosea Williams, just 19, leading the charge on the SCLC’s behalf. SNCC’s chairman, John Lewis, met with Williams at the Brown Chapel AME Church with his members, and there were plans to have Martin Luther King Jr. join the march at some point.
It was hoped that the march would demonstrate the unity of the SNCC and SCLC and push their larger agenda of equal rights for Black voters and civil rights as a whole. What did occur on that fateful day would shock the nation.
When the marchers reached the Edmund Pettus Bridge, state troopers and white residents began to impose their will. Dallas County Sheriff Jim Clark made a wide call to all white men to essentially come to arms and gave out deputy status to anyone who volunteered. The officers attempted to tell the marchers to turn around verbally. From there, the troopers became aggressive and unleashed blows with their nightsticks regardless of age or gender. Adding to this, some troopers fired tear gas into the crowd.
Source: Bettmann / Getty
Lewis was severely injured during the Bloody Sunday march, and images of the future politician are still jarring. Among the dozens of images to emerge from Bloody Sunday, the image of civil rights activist and Dallas County native Amelia Boynton Robinson (who had been registering voters for years) being held by a fellow marcher also stirred the souls of many.
Source: Bettmann / Getty
With the photos of the violence of the march hitting every major news outlet in the States and around the globe, the civil rights movement once more found a catalyst to push for equal voting rights. In the same year, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law.
Williams, who was with King on the night of his assassination in 1968 in Memphis, became the executive director of the SCLC and remained in the position until 1979. He was elected to the Georgia General Assembly in 1974, holding that post for a decade before yielding the seat to his wife, Juanita. Williams later was elected to the Atlanta City Council and was also the DeKalb County commissioner.
Lewis remained connected with the SNCC in the wake of Bloody Sunday and King’s passing but moved on to other organizations, involving himself in voter registration work and advancing civic participation. Like Williams, Lewis was elected to the Atlanta City Council in the early 1980s and later was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1986. Lewis worked as a congressman until July 2020.
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Source: JIM WATSON / Getty
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Mike Jenkins, a real estate developer who reformed his life after spending time in federal prison, was racially profiled in an affluent Ohio neighborhood by Michelle Bishop, a white mother of two. After Michelle Bishop received backlash, she tearfully apologized to Mike Jenkins, claiming she was more worried about the safety of her children and didn’t recognize that Jenkins was Black.
As seen on Yahoo! News, DaMichael “Mike” Jenkins was attempting to return home last November when he encountered Michelle Bishop walking with her two small children. The situation was caught on Jenkins’ Ring camera where Bishop can be heard talking to Jenkins as he pulled up in his driveway. Believing she was being followed, Bishop went up to Jenkins’ doorstep and said she didn’t believe the developer lived at the home.
After Jenkins asked if she was looking for someone in particular, she can be heard running off and screaming despite it appearing Jenkins made no aggressive moves toward her. Jenkins’ wife came out of the home and tried to make sense of it. Jenkins’ wife seemingly diffused the situation and said she was afraid because Jenkins never said he owned the home whose driveway he parked in and he claimed that he did when she was trying to knock on his door.
Bishop has since taken to social media to apologize for assuming the worst of Jenkins and claims she isn’t racist. She also said that her apologies haven’t been accepted among other talking points. With the Ring video making viral rounds, Jenkins was recently a guest on Shannon Sharpe and Chand Ochocinco’s Nightcap podcast along with his wife to discuss the harrowing incident.
To his credit, Mike Jenkins remained calm throughout the entire fracas and wants to use this moment to help inspire others and not cower in the face of judgment. He also mentioned that his long climb to success after serving prison time and his unyielding faith got him past this hurdle.
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Photo: Headshot/DaMichael Jenkins / Affordable Housing Trust for Franklin & Columbus County
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Text messages sent to Black people across the United States after the presidential election have caught the attention of federal authorities.
In the wake of the presidential election Tuesday (Nov. 5), a disturbing phenomenon has occurred in which Black people have received racist text messages summoning them for slavery. The incidents have occurred in close to 25 states, prompting federal agencies to begin investigations.
The troubling messages followed a pattern of addressing the recipients by their name and telling them they were selected to “pick cotton” at a plantation, then ordering them to be ready for pick-up at a certain time. Some variations included references to President-elect Donald Trump, and others included, “NO PHONES.”
The NAACP stated that the messages had been received by college students in Alabama, Maryland, Missouri, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. New York State Attorney General Letitia James confirmed that middle school and high school students as well as college-age students also received those messages in the state. Officials in Connecticut and California confirmed that residents there also received those texts.
The texts were reportedly sent out as early as Wednesday morning (Nov. 6), with reporting by CBS News affirming that it was through a service called Text Now, which offers free phone numbers. The company issued a statement as the news broke, writing: “One or more of our accounts may have been used to send text messages in violation of our terms of service,” adding it shut down the accounts as it became aware. The Federal Bureau confirmed that it was on the case in a statement: “The FBI is aware of the offensive and racist text messages sent to individuals around the country and is in contact with the Justice Department and other federal authorities on the matter.”
In a statement, Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung said that the president-elect’s “campaign has absolutely nothing to do with these text messages.” Trump’s presidential campaign was rife with racist sentiments, ranging from slandering Haitian immigrants in Ohio in August, to having a comedian insult Puerto Ricans at his controversial Madison Square Garden rally last month. The barrage of messages queue up the most dangerous times for Black people in the United States. “These actions are not normal,” said NAACP President Derrick Johnson. “And we refuse to let them be normalized.”
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Source: The Washington Post / Getty / Hulk Hogan
Hulk Hogan got caught in 4K, making a complete a** out himself.
TMZ Sports exclusively shared a video of the WWE Hall-of-Famer talking about allegedly performing wrestling moves on Vice President Kamala Harris while promoting his beer at a bar in Medina, Ohio, on Monday.
The iconic wrestler, who also was caught on tape saying the N-word with the hard ER, also used the moment to take a page out of the MAGA GOP playbook by questioning VP Harris’ racial identity.
Hogan might have realized he had crossed a line blaming his violent rhetoric on the booze he was drinking.
Per TMZ Sports:
The Hulkster was at the Thirsty Cowboy in Medina, Ohio promoting his new beer Monday night when he grabbed the mic and started firing up the crowd … and things quickly flew off the rails.
Hulk asked the place … “Want me to body-slam Kamala Harris? Want me to drop the leg on Kamala?”
Hulk took some more shots at Kamala in Ohio, including mocking her Indian heritage, and making a racist gesture referring to indigenous Americans. So … racist and ignorant, if you’re keeping score.
At that point, Hulk seemed to realize he may have taken things too far … and said it was just the beers talking.
https://twitter.com/tltown2019/status/1825977905375228332
Hulk Hogan Is Team MAGA All The Way
Hogan threw his bandana into the political space when he appeared during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. He happily ripped off his shirt, revealing he was down with the MAGA movement.
His jabs in the video should be no surprise because we know how Team MAGA gets down.
Folks on X, formerly Twitter, have been hitting the Hulkster with Stone Cold Stunner, calling him a racist and expressing disappointment in the once-beloved professional wrestler.
Welp.
He is never beating the racist allegations.
In the gallery below, you can see more reactions to Hulk Hogan making an a** out of himself.
1. We been on the energy
2. Wrestling gods if you’re listening
3. You think?
5. Lol, facts
7. You know that is not happening
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Angela Alsobrooks is preparing to represent the Democratic Party this fall in the upcoming elections for one of Maryland‘s U.S. Senate seats yet is enduring a harrowing event in her home state. A sign featuring Anglea Alsobrooks was defaced in the city of Laurel with racist imagery and police are now investigating.
Angela Alsobrooks, a former state’s attorney for Maryland’s Prince George’s County and also its former county executive, is currently vying for the U.S. Senate against former Republican Party Maryland governor, Larry Hogan.
Maryland, a traditionally Democratic Party-leaning state, handily positioned Alsobrooks against her party rival, Sen. David Trone, en route to earning the right to become just the third Black woman elected to the U.S. Senate. However, unknown forces are looking to dull Alsobrooks’ momentum by defacing a sign.
According to a report from local outlet Fox 5 DC, the perpetrators placed “KKK” symbols on the sign along with placing crosshairs on Alsobrooks’ forehead in the photo. Alsobrooks’ campaign issued a statement to the news station, essentially saying that this brazen attempt to rattle Alsobrooks won’t deter the team’s plans.
“We were made aware of this very unsettling incident, and our paramount concern is Angela’s safety. However, this sort of hateful threat will not deter Angela or her campaign,” read the statement to Fox 5 DC.
Hogan also took to X and posted a statement that hate crimes have no place in the state.
“Hate, threats of violence, and racism must be condemned in the strongest possible terms. They have no place in Maryland,” Hogan wrote, which prompted a flurry of negative replies on not being critical enough of the act.
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Photo: Getty
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